


Urgo

by RhinoHill



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: F/M, Fluff and Angst, Humour, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-18
Updated: 2019-08-25
Packaged: 2020-09-07 01:41:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 8,794
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20301340
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RhinoHill/pseuds/RhinoHill
Summary: There. She’s said it.She’d love to taste him on her tongue, to breathe him in again as he wraps his arms around her. She’s never felt so drawn to anyone.Because he sees her. Through his facade of stupid bravado, he looks right into her soul. And he makes her want to shine for him.





	1. Shut up, Urgo!

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Samantha_Carter_is_my_muse](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Samantha_Carter_is_my_muse/gifts).

> Urgo is a fascinating guy. By his own admission, he only amplifies things his subjects are feeling already. In order to make them happier.
> 
> Hmmm.
> 
> Where could that possibly lead? ;->

_*Sam*_

“Urgo, I don’t care.”

For what must be the seventeenth time that hour, she leaves her computer to pace her lab. This space is her refuge, usually. But usually she doesn’t have a tiny, tubby tyrant in her head, bugging her about her C.O.

  
_Is this what it feels like to have toddlers?_ she wonders distractedly. _Well, no,_ she answers herself. _No,_ her brain repeats emphatically. _Toddlers don’t have beards. And they don’t keep teasing you about your feelings for their dad - your boss - SHIT!_

“HA!” Urgo’s shout makes her spin around to face him. He’s leaning his kaftan-clad body against her spectrum scanner, and it takes all her self-control to remind herself that he is not there, weighs nothing, and therefore can’t damage the careful calibration on the machine.

“Ha, what?” she hisses through clenched teeth.

“Ha, I called it! You want him to be the father of your children.” Urgo rubs a triumphant belly like an understudy from an Aladdin show on Broadway.

She licks her lips, fighting for calm. Her military training has taught her about resisting mind control tactics. Hell, her aunt Edna has taught her more than the Air Force ever could about resisting constant insinuations about her private life. That’s one of the things she loves so much about Jack, she realises. He never makes her feel like less of a woman just because she leads with her mind.

“HA!” comes the shout, and her shoulders tighten against the inevitable continuation of Urgo’s sentence.

“You love him! You just said it! I HEARD you!”

“Urgo.” When she rounds on him, she hides her clenched fists behind her, hoping the deception will go unnoticed, that he won’t realise how raw a nerve he’s touched. “Shut up.”

Ring-laden fingers shoot into the air in surrender and he fades away. With a slow sigh of relief, she returns to the mission report she’s typing.

“So, I’m confused.”

Her eyes close in exasperation, but not before she sees finger-sized legs swinging nonchalantly from her right shoulder, where a canary-sized Urgo is now perched.

“And I guess I’m going to find out why, whether I want to or not,” she sighs.

“Well, technically, YOU'RE the one who’s confused,” the apparition on her shoulder squeaks sagely, nodding his beard. “You see, I’m just a - what quaint term do you use for it again? - oh, yes, a _programme running in your subconscious_. I’m only locking on to thoughts that you’re already having.”

“Fine.” She pushes herself away from her keyboard, her knuckles white on the edge of her desk. “What am I confused about?”

“Why don’t you just tell him how you feel?”

“You see, this is how I know you’re not really inside my head.” Her answer carries more venom than she intended, but then again, he’s a non-entity. She shouldn’t care about being kind to him.

“Why?” His legs are now dangling over the front of her laptop screen, and she has to resist the urge to slam it shut and trap him in it.

“Because if you really knew me, you’d know why that isn’t possible," she shuts down the argument instead.

“Oh, regulations. Pish-posh codwollop.”

“Pish-what?” She can’t stop her lips from tweaking into a smile at the bizarre mix of syllables he chooses to turn into words. Somehow, they always convey exactly the right meaning.

“You’re deflecting.” A ruby catches the light as he waggles a minuscule finger at her.

“And you’re annoying.”

The conversation reminds her more and more of childhood fights with her brother. And makes her realise that she has to stop.

“Urgo, I can’t tell him how I feel because there’s nothing we can do about it.” A part of her mind resents the fact that she’s explaining this out loud to a sentient piece of code, but still, it feels cathartic. She’s never spoken how he makes her feel.

“But you’d like to.” Urgo raises a saucy eyebrow.

“Urgo, look,” she spins away from her desk, only to find him hovering in front of her, a pint-sized mid-air therapist. “What I’d like to do is irrelevant. Because actions have consequences in the real world.”

_There. She’s said it. She’d love to taste him on her tongue, to breathe him in again as he wraps his arms around her. She’s never felt so drawn to anyone. Because he sees her. Through his facade of stupid bravado, he looks right into her soul. And he makes her want to shine for him._ Her shoulders slump around the truth of it.

“Sam. Sammy.”

The term of endearment only her uncle Irvin and her mother ever used flies at her from Urgo and lodges in her heart. Tears prickle behind her eyelids.

“Anything is possible, Sammy,” his words continue to beat against her ribs, an echo of her mother creeping into his voice from carefully buried memories. “And from what you know of him, he’s the one person who will value your feelings more than regulations.”

The tears that have been threatening, spill across her cheeks. Her mother’s advice in the mouth of a stranger is more than she can bear. She staggers back against the wall and sinks down to the floor, cradling her head between her pulled-up knees.

“Shut up, Urgo,” she whispers around the lump in her throat. “Please.”

  
—oOo—

_*Jack*_

“I’m still not talkin’ to ya. Seriously, aren’t you bored yet? Here’s a hint,” Jack jabs at the tap in the shower, “I have years of experience ignoring people who try to tell me what to do.” Warm water washes over his tired muscles. He hopes the little creep in his head hasn’t noticed that he drove him to punching a hole in the boxing bag five minutes earlier - something only Teal’c has achieved in the SGC gym to date.

“And how good are you at ignoring the woman you love?”

The sound of bone connecting with metal echoes around the shower as his fist thunders into the smarmy, bearded apparition dangling its legs over the taps. The metal tang of blood in the air echoes the dull sting in his knuckles.

“Fuck off, Urgo,” he mutters as he lathers up, careful to focus on the sting of split knuckles under minty shower gel.

Careful not to focus on her.

“I’m only asking,” the dangling mini-legs catch his eye from his right shoulder where the tiny creep is perched now, “because she’s not doing so well.”

“What do you mean?” He’s pulled on jeans and a t-shirt, but the material chafes against his still-wet skin. He wishes he could throttle Urgo for making his heart leap into his throat like that at the mere mention of her.

“Well,” his royal smugness continues as he stomps down the corridor towards her lab, “I’d tell you to use your common sense, but apparently you’re both in denial about what you have in common here.”

“Your annoying ass in our heads?”

He can actually _feel_ the idiot in his head rolling his eyes as he rounds the corner to her darkened lab.

“Carter?” he calls softly as he pushes against the open door. “Sam?” he gasps as he sees her slumped on the floor against the wall, head cradled in his hands.

“Go with your gut,” Urgo whispers in his ear as he crouches down in front of her, catching fresh tear tracks on her cheeks in the dim green glow of her myriad instruments. “She likes it when you call her Sam.”

His hand finds the solid warmth of her knee.

“Shut up, Urgo.” he growls.


	2. Drop it, right now.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Drop it, right now,” Jack growls at Urgo from behind her. “Don’t even fool around.”
> 
> “You,” she suddenly feels seventeen again, throat dry, heart thumping, “you hear him saying that stuff too?”
> 
> “Yes, I’ve tuned you both in to the ‘You Only Live Once’ channel. Enjoy it just for one night, won’t you? For your own stuck-behind-the-regulations sakes, even if not for me? Please?” Urgo, finally a less imposing size again, seems genuinely sad for the first time since he colonised her brain.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The original inspiration for this work was @Samantha_Carter_is_my_muse's Tumblr post about Desperate Measures, which (we asume) was banned because of the words "Drop it, right now, don't even fool around" and "Very dramatic, thank you."
> 
> Part one of that dialogue lodged here. WIth a tiny homage to @Steffi1510 and her beautiful inked sketches of our favourites. Thank you for being you xo

_*Sam*_

  
She tries to smile, but it comes out as a weak, tearful grimace. Every fibre in her leans towards the warmth of his hand on her knee. Her tongue darts out in the habitual gesture, but when she licks her lips she catches a shimmer of blue jello on her lips, tart and sweet and spicy. The taste she imagines when she thinks of kissing him.

_This has gone from sad to dangerous, Sam_, her mind shouts at her as she draws the sweet blue taste of him back into her mouth. She bites down on her bottom lip and nods, drawing herself up higher against the wall. Squaring her shoulders against the urge to feel his skin under her fingers.

She feels his weight shifting through silent air until his right shoulder comes to rest against her left and her left calf presses up against his right. His hand on her knee has not moved.

For a moment, a ghost of Jack’s hands trace the outline of her ribs. Her breath shakes. Next to her, she feels him stiffening. But not in response to her. At the same time.

Her eyes fly open in the darkness.

“Urgo?” she whispers, dread and warning mingled in her tone.

The rotund figure clasps thrilled hands in front of him. “I made it happen! Just the two of you, alone in your room. The whole night ahead of you. Aah! Young love!” He curtsies with the grace of a teenage hippo and taps his finger against his nose. “You can thank me later.”

“Urgo, NO!”

Shock slams her off the floor. But the minute she loses contact with his warmth, she wishes she had let it slide. Wrapping her arms around her ribs where seconds before Urgo had made her imagine the pressure of his fingers, she turns her body to face him.

“I’m sorry, sir.”

Her voice is an unnecessary whisper. Urgo is right. There’s no-one in her wing this late at night. “Having him in my head is…” she wipes angrily at her wet cheeks, “it’s giving me a whole new level of respect for people with schizophrenia who have to live like this.”

The glow of her monitors sharpens the lines of his face, etching the slow, ironic grin into him like an ink sketch. He rises off the floor, bracing his weight on his left hand. His right - the one that just rested on her knee, hovers between them. His knuckles are raw and bloody.

“Must be just you then,” he whispers back over her sharp intake of breath, “because he’s not makin’ me punch things at all.”

Before she knows she’s moved, his hand is clasped in both of hers, her thumbs feathering the bruised skin around the broken. The slightest pressure from her wrist, and his arm softens, letting her guide his hand closer. Gently, she presses her cool lips against his hot, broken skin.

“Sam.”

_FUCK._

Her name in his mouth wrenches her back into reality. She drags herself upright and tries to free her fingers, but he holds her left hand in a firm grip. She screws her eyes shut and twists her body away from his grasp.

“Sorry. I’m sorry.”

“Hey, Carter.” His breath raises the hairs on the back of her neck as he whispers calm reassurance. “We’re in a hostage situation here.” He pulls her backwards, touching her bowstring-taut spine against his chest. “It’s okay,” he breathes against her ear. “We’ll get through this.”

“Oh, come on!” Urgo looms over them, suddenly larger than life. “There’s nothing to get through apart from kissing the guy! On the mouth, for a change. How hard can it be?”

  
“Drop it, right now,” Jack growls at Urgo from behind her. “Don’t even fool around.”

“You,” she suddenly feels seventeen again, throat dry, heart thumping, “you hear him saying that stuff too?”

“Yes, I’ve tuned you both in to the ‘You Only Live Once’ channel. Enjoy it just for one night, won’t you? For your own stuck-behind-the-regulations sakes, even if not for me? Please?” Urgo, finally a less imposing size again, seems genuinely sad for the first time since he colonised her brain.

“Okay, Urgo. What’ll it take for you to leave us alone?” Jack’s exasperated, but his voice also holds an edge of amusement. Her back softens a fraction. She knows that he won’t ever let her down.

“Admit how you feel. Ah!” fingers clasp each other around jewelled rings, “there is nothing better than true love, is there? Well, okay, maybe true lust.” Urgo's eyebrows shoot skywards suggestively, beating a syncopated rhythm against each syllable as he continues. “True a-ni-mal mag-ne-tism!”

“Oh god.” Horror overpowers her embarrassment. “Is he actually doing the pelvic thrust?”

A soft snort, and Jack pulls her closer. His left arm closes around her body, wrapping her completely against him.

“Okay, Urgo, so we’re both seein’ you," Jack says.

He’s close enough that his voice vibrates through her spine from his chest when he speaks.

“That means we’re both seein’ ya in that beautiful pair of lacy hot-pink undies. The ones with the sateen bow just below yer belly button?” Jack continues.

Shocked silence descends on Sam’s lab, as Urgo shimmers and reappears, hairy, round and naked, save for a pair of silky hot-pink knickers with lace curling into the hair on his legs. His beard quivers as he looks down, from left to right, and then back up again.

“You wouldn’t.” Urgo whispers, eyes wide.

Behind her, she feels Jack shrugging a nonchalant shoulder.

_Fuck, I love his mind, _she thinks.

“HA!” Strippergram Urgo points a pudgy finger straight at her nose. “You LOVE him! You just said it! You love him, you love him, you love him.”

But she hasn’t even finished collapsing around her heart before his voice tugs her back.

  
“Look, Carter,” he breathes against her ear. “I guess moobs that big deserve a diamante-clad bra.”

“Oh, no!” Urgo clasps his arms around his torso. “That’s dirty play!”

“And what you’ve been doin’ to us is clean?”

At the sound of Jack’s question, Sam’s head snaps up, just as Urgo’s drops.

“You have to admit, Urgo,” she gentles. “He’s got a point.”

“Fine,” their shared apparition hangs his head. “I’ll leave you alone. As long as you promise to at least _talk_ to each other about your feelings?” He shakes his head disconsolately, making his hot-pink bikini tremble. “Seriously. You two need some sort of push. If privacy is what you need, I’m willing to look the other way.” He shrugs, setting hot pink satin jiggling. “For the greater good, you know. And for clothes.”

\--oOo--


	3. Pie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “So do you have a favourite?” Her fingers linger on his palm, raising goosebumps on his arm.
> 
> “Hmmm?” He can’t take his eyes off hers. They’re grey-blue in the semi-darkness.
> 
> “Pie, sir. Do you have a favourite pie, or is it a universal kind of love?” Her fingertips move over his palm, tracing a line up towards the edge of his bandage.
> 
> “Right. Pie. Look, I wouldn’t kick any pie out of my fridge, but. Peach.”
> 
> “Peach.”
> 
> “Peach.” He takes a step close to her, closer to her vanilla-honey hair, her peach-soft skin.
> 
> \--oOo--

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "That was very dramatic, thank you."
> 
> The opening lines of chapter 3 are the final ribbon in a gift to @Samantha_Carter_is_my_muse, reusing lines from Desperate Measures that seemed saucy enough for Tumblr to ban her post.
> 
> It's also the most fun I've ever had writing humour.   
I love Urgo. Even more than pie. And almost as much as I love you, AO3 unicorns.  
xo
> 
> \--oOo--

_*Jack* _

“That was very… dramatic. Thank you.”

He swears he can feel her smiling. It’s as if her emotions radiate through her skin.

He nods, moving his head against the softness of her hair.

“We live to serve,” he says with a wink.

Her low chuckle makes the pit of his stomach glow.

_Feelings._ The toddler in their heads told them to discuss their feelings. _For each other._ Gently, he tightens his arms around her, pulling her further into him.

“You alright?” He asks into her hair. Slowly, he feels her shoulders loosening.

She lets out a long, slow sigh.

“I will be. Thank you, sir.”

He breathes in the silence and the scent of her, the rise and fall of her back against him.

“I would like to get a dressing on your hand though.” Her words are carefully neutral, but he can feel heat radiating from her face. He wishes he could explain to her how much that small, unguarded gesture, her lips against his pain, meant to him.

“Well, now I see why _she’s_ the brains in your operation.” Urgo has his arms tightly folded against his bare midriff and is tapping the toe of one shoe against the floor. “The _point_ of this whole excercise IS for you to explain to her how much it means. Really! They put _you_ in charge?”

“Fuck OFF, Urgo,” Jack growls. “Actually, wait.” In a puff of matinee smoke, Urgo’s shoes are replaced with dainty pink, heeled slippers, complete with fluffy trim. The round, bearded face stares at his feet in consternation. “_Now_ fuck off.”

Again, the soft, low chuckle comes and turns his belly to liquid flame. She steps out of his arms and pulls a cupboard door open, bringing out a small medical kit. He obediently holds out his right hand, crinkling his nose against the sting of disinfectant.

Memories of her lips flood his head and threaten to spill out of his mouth, but he knows she would crumple if he mentions it. _His strong, fierce major, with her tender heart. _

“So I guess he’s going to keep bugging us until I come clean with ya, Carter,” he sighs dramatically.

Her hands freeze. Startled blue eyes lock on to his. He tries what he hopes is a winning smile and not the nervous schoolboy grin he feels plastered across his face.

“I love pie. Just love it. I find it hard to even describe to you what pie means to me.”

Her smile, _that_ smile, the one that tugs dimples into her cheeks, lights up her face as she looks back down at his hand and softly dabs antiseptic cream onto his split knuckles.

“In fact, just being in the same room as pie makes me feel happy,” he blunders on.

She wraps a thin strip of gauze around his knuckles, turning his hand palm-up to tuck the loose end in securely.

“How’s that feeling?” The twinkle in her eyes, the slight emphasis on the last word, tells him she’s joined him in the game.

“Well…” he flexes his fingers experimentally, “not as good as eating pie.”

Her smile is growing and it’s making his feel more real by the heartbeat.

“But it beats aiming for an annoying alien hologram and punching a tap.”

“So do you have a favourite?” Her fingers linger on his palm, raising goosebumps on his arm.

“Hmmm?” He can’t take his eyes off hers. They’re grey-blue in the semi-darkness.

“Pie, sir. Do you have a favourite pie, or is it a universal kind of love?” Her fingertips move over his palm, tracing a line up towards the edge of his bandage.

“Right. Pie. Look, I wouldn’t kick any pie out of my fridge, but. Peach.”

“Peach.”

“Peach.” He takes a step close to her, closer to her vanilla-honey hair, her peach-soft skin.

“Why peach?”

He’s close enough that she only needs to whisper. Her fingers trace over the bandage on his knuckles and down the bare skin on the other side.

“Oh, it’s not a single thing, really,” he whispers back. “There’s the vanilla sugar on the crust.” He brings a lock of her hair to his nose. “Smells a little like you. But it’s not all sweet, and I love that. The peaches are tart and fresh, more complex than most other pies. And they’re soft, but not too soft. They make you work for them, they don’t just fall apart the minute they hit your tongue…”

He trails off, overwhelmed by the need to kiss her.

The fingers of his right hand curl around hers. She closes the space between their bodies. He runs his left hand along the edge of her face.

“What about you?” His whisper is hoarse.

She swallows, and when her mouth opens to answer it’s the only thing he can see.

“Blue jello,” she smiles up at him. “I really love blue jello.”

“Blue jello.” He carries on the game. He never wants it to end.

“Blue jello.” Her eyes are darker now, stormy grey.

She licks her lips. “They served it in the canteen on the day I met you.”

She shakes her head lightly as if to dislodge a thought and a blush creeps along her cheeks under his fingers.

“On the day I joined SG-1,” she corrects. “I’ve wanted to taste it ever since.”

Jack bends his head until his forehead brushes hers.

“And?” He breathes.

“I love it.”

Deep inside him, something gives up fighting and floats.

“Sam,” he leans his forehead against her in surrender. “Sam, you’re going to have to tell me to stop if you don’t want this.”

“OH, FOR CRYIN’ OUT LOUD!” The shout comes at him in stereo. Urgo stands on both of their right shoulders, quivering with indignation. Both hims stamp slippered feet to the rhythm of his words.

“After all that talk of pie and peaches? You’ve seen her in combat, you wombat! Do you really think she’d let you get this close if she wanted you to stop?! For the love of all that is holy, JUST KISS THE GIRL!”

A shudder of helpless laughter blooms from her hips and shakes her face under his hand.

“I’m sorry.” She clears her throat to regain control. “Shut up, Urgo.”

Soft fingers trace his jaw and curve around to pull his lips towards her. Her eyes hold him helpless.

“But,” she whispers against his mouth. “What he said.”


	4. First Kiss

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She moans and arches into his touch.
> 
> With an answering groan, he cups the curve of her butt and swings her around and up onto her desk.
> 
> His elbow brushes something cold.
> 
> \--oOo--

Their first kiss is hesitant, as if a sudden move will burst the moment and leave them alone in darkness. Her tongue trails sweetness over his lips. His eyes drift closed. He takes her in with fingertips, with small, nervous sips. Slowly, the pressure of her body against him grows. Her hands are in his hair, on his back, pulling him deeper.

He allows his hands to float along her slender neck, to linger in the hollow of her throat, to trace the outline of her ribs.

She moans and arches into his touch.

His body erupts into flame. He lifts her off the floor and cradles her against him, aching with need for her. Hungrily, he drinks her in: her mouth, her cheeks, the peach-soft skin that flushes and ripples with goosebumps under his tongue.

Another moan escapes her and she wraps her legs around him. Her hands pull his mouth back to hers, back into their kiss.

With an answering groan, he cups the curve of her butt and swings her around and up onto her desk, pushing ever closer to the heat between her thighs, bringing him to the very edge of his control.

His elbow brushes something cold.

A grinding slide, a shuddering crash.

An ominous, glassy tinkle.

Combat instinct kicks in. He steps back, knees lightly bent, heart thudding in his throat. His arms rise up to shield her back, even though he knows there is no danger in the room apart from him. He knows exactly what happened. He lost control and undid months of her work in a single, thoughtless moment.

_Wombat, _he hisses at himself. _Stupid, clumsy roadkill with square poop. How the fuck did you ever think you deserved her?_ Stiffly, he tries to pull away. 

Warm fingers curl into his hair and lift his face to hers.

Schoolboy guilt floods through him. He looks up with a grimace.

The happiness shining in her eyes makes him gasp. Her hands glide forwards, cupping his chin. Softly, she presses her lips to his in a lingering kiss so sweet it steals his breath away. She guides his head to rest in the crook of her neck her and wraps him in her arms while his breathing steadies and his heartbeat slows.

“It was _so _worth it,” she whispers into his hair.


	5. Hello

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Heat bursts through her, certain and searing as the sun. She raises both hands to his chest, balls his shirt into her fists, and pulls him into her.
> 
> \--oOo--

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those who have been reading as I posted:  
1) I love you. Thank you.  
2) This chapter curled its hands into the story and pulled it firmly from "General" into "Mature" - hence the change in tags.
> 
> Ahem. Not sorry. ;->
> 
> \--oOo--

His truck pulled up outside her house just after dark and he’s been sitting in it for an hour. She paces the hallway, arguing with herself out loud. Urgo’s been gone since this morning.

She misses his advice.

“It’s your own bloody advice, Sam,” she rants as she makes another about-turn at the door. “The only difference is that Urgo wasn’t stuck behind your fear. Just grow up and go talk to him!”

She swivels on bare feet at the end of the hallway and turns back towards the door, the hem of her pale blue dress swirling around her thighs with impatience.

“If you’re planning on spending the night out here, I could bring you a blanket?” she tries. _Bitchy much?_ She sighs.

“Look, sir, I know we need to talk, but could we just have one more night?” _That’s great, Sam. You’ve just called your C.O. a hooker._ She shakes her head angrily and turns back at the door.

“I love you, Jack.” She slows. And stops. _Okay, that’s true at least. But what if it’s too much? He only kissed you once, and that was borderline coerced, to be perfectly frank. You threw yourself at him. And you CRIED. For god’s sake._

She picks a speck of fluff off her dress where it rises over her breasts, and suddenly his hands are back on her ribs and her memory arches into the ghost of his touch.

“I want you Jack. I need you.” _Goddamnit, she does. Her whole body is tingling with the need to feel his lips, his warm fingers, his strong arms. The pulsing ache in her sex needs him. The emptiness in her heart needs him._ She wraps her arms around her ribs, willing her feet to stop from running to him.

She hears the soft metal moan and thud of his truck door closing, his steps approaching her door. She bites her lip against the trembling growing inside her. As he reaches her door, she opens it.

His right hand is raised in a tight fist, interrupted on it way to knocking. He’s wearing a dark red flannel button-down shirt, not his habitual loose-fitting T. The sleeves are rolled up to his elbows and the top buttons reveal his nut brown throat, and below that a V of creamy skin where his BDUs protect him from the sun.

She cannot stop looking at that glimpse of skin.

She swallows, and opens her mouth, not sure what sound will escape, just knowing that she somehow has to speak.

His right hand unfurls in the air. He cups her face in his palm.

Heat bursts through her, certain and searing as the sun. She raises both hands to his chest, balls his shirt into her fists, and pulls him into her.

Their lips connect and he’s kissing her, hungry, insistent. She moans into his mouth and her hand snakes around the back of his head to keep him close. She steps back and he follows her across the threshold. She feels him raising a foot off the floor, then the front door slams shut behind them, the wood vibrating from his well-aimed kick. Exactly as she is vibrating from his touch. She steps forward and moulds herself against him, but it’s not enough. Another step forward, then another, leading him backwards until his back connects with the door and she can press into him, too close to breathe in more than gasps. Finally, almost close enough.

Then his hands are on her back, her butt, her legs, making her gasp and moan and grind her hips into him. His hands slide under the hem of her dress. She shudders against him as he drags them up, across the rise of her hips to the sensitive skin on the small of her back.

She pulls out of their kiss. She has to see his face.

His eyes are pools of want and wonder. His mouth is open and his lips move as he pulls strong fingers up over her ribs. The only sound is her ragged breathing; he is silent, but his lips shape her name over and over.

His thumbs hook under the front of her bra and lift it up to find her nipples, rubbing them in hard, slow circles until her shuddering moans build into a cry of release and she lets her eyes close and her head fall back. Surrendering her body to his hands.

He softens, slows. Warm lips rain kisses down her neck and onto the swell of her breasts. Safe arms pull her against his chest as he unclips her bra and pulls her dress up over her head. His arms surround her again, fingers lacing into her hair. Holding her steady as a slow, gentle kiss brings her back to life.

She lowers her head to his chest and runs her tongue along the edge of his shirt, dipping into the creamy V of untouched skin. The purr that rises from his throat makes her want to lose control again, but she forces herself to slow. One by one, she opens his buttons, following her fingers with her tongue as his breathing grows faster, his hands on her back more insistent. When his jeans are undone, she reaches up and pulls his shirt down over his shoulders before kneeling down in front of him. She looks up at him, smiling desire. Then she takes him into her mouth.

His fingers tangle through her hair, holding her head as she slides along his shaft, silky soft, burning hot, sweet with the start of his release. Her entire body shudders when he moans and pulls her firmly away. On her knees in front of him, she looks up into his face, aching, eyes begging him to touch her again.

Without breaking eye contact, he toes off his shoes and steps out of his jeans. He bends down and lifts her into his arms, cushioning her head and back when he lowers them both to the ground. His kiss is deep and tender, his tongue stroking her lips and teeth as his fingers stroke her hair. His hands whisper down her body, glide over her soaking, silken panties, and pull them down her legs. One by one, he lifts her feet, kissing the arches as he slides the scrap of material over her toes.

  
She lies naked in front of him, panting, glistening with her need.

  
With an animal growl, he grasps her hips and lifts them, driving himself into her over and over, deeper and deeper, until his cries and her own mingle and the room explodes into stars.

It takes minutes for her to drift down from the ceiling. He’s draped across her, head resting in the crook of her neck. His fingers trace paths along her body and hers feather over his back, down to the curve of his butt, up to the softness of his hair. He raises himself onto his elbows, the shift driving him into her again and making her whimper with pleasure.

With burning eyes, he kisses her.  
“Um. So.” he says. “Hello.”

Her helpless laughter shakes her against him and a second wave of pleasure ripples through her. He pulls her close, teasing her mouth and throat and breasts until she arches into him again and contracts around him in waves of release.

“God, I love you, Sam.”

  
The whisper escapes him in a rush and he stiffens, as if fearful that she’ll run away now that she knows the truth.

Gentle hands lift his head so that she can look into his eyes. In the silence of the evening, on her hallway carpet, the loneliness that has lurked beneath her skin since he first saw her, fades into love. And then she kisses him.


	6. Regret

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He knows the logic behind her words too well. Don’t become attached. Do everything you can for your team, but never let your feelings endanger the mission. He’s come dangerously close with her before. Closer than with anybody else. He knows how hard it is to put your head above your heart.
> 
> \--oOo--

Her nightmare wakes them both.

As he’s done a thousand times in the field with a hundred different soldiers, he holds her arms gently, preventing injury to them both, as he whispers her awake around her screams.

But tonight is different. Tonight he folds her arms against his chest, he cups her head in his hands as he whispers to her.

“Sam, my love, wake up. It’s just a dream. It’s okay. It’s just a dream.”

She shudders into wakeful stillness in the pre-dawn halflight, and seems to realise that she’s not alone. Blue eyes fly open, piercing him with her terror.

Slowly, he moves his hands across her back in soothing circles.

“Talk me through it,” he says.

Words he has spoken a thousand times to a hundred different people. Words he has learnt to say to help his troops talk through their night terror before it settles in their bones. Because talking helps them spot the inevitable errors in their dreams - the dead friends still living, the fatal campaigns survived. Talking through their terror is the thing that helps them close their eyes again as they separate their worst fears from reality.

He’s learnt to say the words without listening to the responses, because your nightmares reveal truths your C.O. shouldn’t know.

Her eyes lock onto his.

“I watched you die,” she whispers. She clenches them closed in pain. “I can’t watch you die.”

Silence closes like a fist around her. As the day grows brighter outside her bedroom, she draws further into her darkness. And cold dread lashes its barbed tail in his gut.

“Carter, it was just a dream. I’m here. I love you and I’m here.”

Her arms push her away from him, and though his heart screams out to keep her close, he lets her go. The second he loses her touch, a flame in his heart gutters for lack of air.

She draws her knees up to her chest, arms tightly clasped around them. Her sheet becomes her shield.

“I’ve watched you die in dreams before,” she says. Her breath shudders.

He knows how hard the talking is. But he also knows she’ll always see it through, because that’s how you get past nightmares. With spoken truths. _His strong, fierce major. With her tender heart._

“But that was before.” Her words are barely a whisper.

He sits up and pulls her against him. She lets him guide her head to his chest, but she doesn’t unclench. Her arms remain locked around her knees.

“I can’t pretend what happened doesn’t matter.” Her words pierce his heart. “And I don’t think I’d be able to step through a gate and watch you put yourself in danger. I’m scared of what I’ll do. I’m scared my heart will lead my head and I’ll put everyone in danger because I love you and I can’t watch you die.”

_When did “I love you” become a curse?_

He knows the logic behind her words too well. Don’t become attached. Do everything you can for your team, but never let your feelings endanger the mission. He’s come dangerously close with her before. Closer than with anybody else. He knows how hard it is to put your head above your heart.

He swallows and forces lightness into his tone.

“C’mon Carter, your brain is a national treasure.” He rubs reassuring circles on her arm. “There’s no situation in which your head won’t win.”

She twists away from his chest to look at him. Blue eyes are bruised by unshed tears.

“It didn’t win last night,” she whispers.

Dread lashes its barbed tail up his back and freezes him against the words he somehow knows will come. Against the words she’s opening her mouth to say.

“It was a mistake.”

Her head drops onto her knees, shutting him out. The last flame in his heart goes out.

And suddenly flares back to furious life. All the love he’s held in a balled fist unfurls and thunders through his veins.

“NO.”

His voice reverberates against the walls. He twists out of the covers and comes to kneel in front of her. Naked. Vulnerable. His hands cup her head.

“Look at me, Sam. Please.”

Reluctantly, she lifts her head.

“Last night was one of the most beautiful nights of my life. You are the most precious thing in my life. I realise there are complications here. But I will NOT let you call this a mistake.”

Without his armour of humour, his heart feels as exposed as his body. But she is more important than his fear. He realises that now.

“If you can’t work with me, that’s fine. I’ll resign, or ask for a different posting. If you don’t want me around, I’ll back off. I love you, Samantha Carter. I will spend the rest of my life loving you. And I will do what you ask me to do. But I won’t let you call this a mistake. I won’t do that.”

The tears that have been building in her eyes spill down her cheeks, and find their match in his own. In the cold light of a new day, they cry for impossible choices.

He touches his mouth to hers in a silent kiss that tastes of bitter goodbyes.

“I’m going to give you space to think. But I’m not going away until you ask me to. And I will never regret loving you.”

On silent feet, he walks away. She hears the front door open and close, and her body aches to feel him against her again, pressed against the door in a moment where they were all that mattered in the world.

“I will always love you too, Jack,” she whispers to his shadow. “I just don’t know if I’m strong enough.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry. I know this wasn't funny. But Sam and Jack are Sam and Jack because they live in this painful reality.  
In the cold, morning light, they'd always face their fears and they wouldn't let me pretend otherwise.
> 
> But as a small consolation, this scene echoes that morning-after scene from Affinity.
> 
> For everyone else who shudders at the thought of Bloody Pete, this is a peace offering.  
THIS is the morning after answer she deserves from her lover...


	7. Yes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> His hand closes tightly around hers, but he doesn’t move. She hears him swallow before he speaks, his voice thrumming with tension.
> 
> “Yes, what?"
> 
> She pulls back in confusion. She wants to feel his face under her hands, to read him with her fingers, but his question and his tone frighten her with their coiled control.
> 
> “Yes, Sir?” she tries uncomfortably.
> 
> \--oOo--

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “I do all of this to find her, because it’s the only way I can ever be with her. I do all of this, every day, for the chance to be with her. Of course I have nightmares about her being killed. Of COURSE I do, Sam. But you know what would be worse than watching her die? Choosing not to watch her live, just because of my fear. That would be unforgivable.”
> 
> A little tribute to Daniel. Alchemist of words.
> 
> \--oOo--

Her lab feels like a tiger cage, and her heart leaps from feeling like the hungry, captured tiger to the bird that found its way in somehow and now flies frantically in the maw of its death, unable to find its way back to freedom.

Everything reminds her of him: the edge of her desk where they shared their first kiss, the empty space where the Naquidah generator prototype their kiss pushed on to the floor had stood until two days and an eternity ago. The spot on the floor behind the door where she had been crying in desperation because Urgo wouldn’t stop forcing her to face her feelings for him.

She gives up and crumples in the same spot, knees drawn up to her chest, arms clasped around them. Like a poltergeist, the memory of his arms surrounds her again, pulling her towards him and resting her head against his chest, as he had just hours earlier. Whispering he loves her.

Forcing her mind to calm, she casts back to two days ago. The last time she sat here. Before she knew how he feels. Before she knew how he tastes. She was crying then, too. _Did that not feel just as lonely?_ She had coped with her feelings for him for over a year before Urgo arrived and she started getting reckless.

_No._ She shakes her head against her knees, but the voice in her head won’t disappear. _I wasn’t nearly as desperately lonely as I am now. Because I had no idea he wanted the same thing. How can I just carry on now?_  
_How can I carry on now?_

“Sam?” Daniel’s soft voice pushes her lab door open before she has a chance to recover. It only takes him a moment to find her on the floor. And, God bless Daniel, somehow he can see it without her feeling judged.

Slowly, he slides down against her heavy desk, echoing her posture, facing her. The tip of his boot comes to rest against the toe of her own. Contact. Exactly what she craves. Exactly the thing that will undo her.

She looks up at him, and then clamps her lips together and looks away as a flood of fresh tears spill silently out.

“Wanna talk about it?”

His gentle words, the exact replica of Jack’s words to her in her bed this morning, physically jerk her into dread.

“He told you?!” Her voice brims with disbelief.

The slow, understanding pinch of skin between Daniel’s eyebrows, the way he pushes his glasses back up the bridge of his nose while he searches for the right words, rains cold realisation down her back. Jack told Daniel nothing. SHE just told Daniel everything. _I can’t carry on like this._ She drops her head onto her knees in defeat.

Daniel waits a full minute before he speaks again. And though she can’t bear to look at him and give even more away, she can picture the pull of his mouth as he carefully places the words one behind the other, watching her to make sure they’re the right ones. An alchemist of words.

“I’m going to go out on a limb here,” he says, “and talk about a theory I have. It’s just speculation, nothing else.” He pauses for the words to sink in.

“When Urgo was… here,” he continues, “He didn’t only make me eat dessert. He spoke to me about Sha’re. And about Sarah. She was a researcher with me in Chicago.” He pauses, blows out a slow breath. “I hadn’t thought about her for years, because it’s easier not to think about someone you have feelings for than to confront them and do something about it.”

Another silence stretches into the space between them. Each of his words walk him closer to speaking her truth out loud. And if he can see it so easily, who else can? _I CAN’T carry on like this._

“Now, this is where the speculation starts.” Daniel hesitates only for a second before pushing on. “Jack is a bear with a sore tooth, and you’re in here. Sam,” he waits for her to look up, and when she doesn’t, he carries on with a sigh. “Sam, you’re both serious professionals. I know you would do nothing to jeopardise the SGC or your roles, but…”

He stops talking when he sees her shudder.

_We broke regulations and now I’ve jeopardised the safety of the team on future missions because I can’t watch him die. You’re wrong, Daniel. There’s nothing professional about me. I fucked up so badly. And I have no idea how to fix this._ Her heart flutters. A trapped bird in a tiger’s cage

“Sam?” His question hangs in the air.

“Daniel,” she bites her bottom lip. Her voice and her eyes scream at him for help. “You’re doing all of this-” she gestures around the lab “-to find Sha’re. Because you love her. How can you live with the the thought that one day you may watch her get killed in front of you?”

In front of her, her gentle friend pulls back his shoulders. A knife-edge of anger that she’s never seen before appears in the set of his mouth, the cut of his words. His voice is even quieter than usual, but scalpel sharp.

“I do all of this to find her, because it’s the only way I can ever be with her. I do all of this, every day, for the chance to be with her. Of course I have nightmares about her being killed. Of _course_ I do, Sam. But you know what would be worse than watching her die? Choosing not to watch her live, just because of my fear. That would be unforgivable.”

Daniel holds her gaze with his knife-edge eyes. Then he gets up and heads to the door.

“I’ve invited Teal’c and Jack round to my place tonight. I figured we could use a chance to laugh about Urgo without Janet wanting to check us for insanity. I hope you’ll come too.”  
  
The door clicks shut behind him, cutting her off from the rest of the base. A closed door between them. It's as if Daniel realised why she never closed her lab door, and did it to force her to confront the fact.

She has never been able to bear being disconnected from him.

In a second, she’s breaking into a run on the way to Jack’s office. She slams around his door, but it’s empty. She swivels and runs towards the canteen, forcing herself to slow to an urgent walk when two airmen look at her in alarm. Remembering herself, she wipes her hands across her cheeks to erase the tears.

Startled faces look up at her when she skids into the canteen, scans it, and careens away again, breaking back into a run as she takes the quieter corridor towards the gym.

He’s benchpressing an impossible amount. Without a spotter. Fear clenches her heart into a tiny ball. Forcing her feet to move slowly, she walks into his line of sight to avoid startling him.

Muscles cord in his arms as he lifts the bar above his chest and sees her. Slowly, carefully, he releases the weights into the bracket above his head.

She releases a breath she didn’t realise she was holding.

His eyes stay locked on hers as he sits up. His face betrays nothing to the people working out around them as he gets up and walks towards the door.

In the corridor, he slows until she catches up with him. He glances at her, pain flashing through his face when he takes in her swollen eyes. Then he looks pointedly at the security camera above them and starts walking. Left turn around a corner, right turn around the next. He’s close enough that the back of his hand brushes hers with almost every step. Her heart stutters. Suddenly, he stops and opens a door. A supply cupboard. A hole in the wall, sharp with the smell of disinfectant, pitch black when the door closes behind them. No camera.

She can feel him in front of her, coiled like a spring. She reaches forward and touches the fabric of his T-shirt, soaking wet with his effort. He doesn’t move. Just waits.

“Yes.” She whispers. By touch, she finds his shoulder, his arm, then his hand. She laces her fingers through his.

His hand closes tightly around hers, but he doesn’t move. She hears him swallow before he speaks, his voice thrumming with tension.

“Yes, what?”

She pulls back in confusion. She wants to feel his face under her hands, to read him with her fingers, but his question and his tone frighten her with their coiled control.

“Yes, Sir?” she tries uncomfortably.

His hands are on her in the darkness, fumbling to find her face.

“Sam, no! I mean yes to what?” His voice cracks. “What do you need from me? I’ve got a resignation letter ready if that’s what you want.”

The wave of love and relief that washes over her spills fresh tears over his thumbs on her cheeks. Her hands find his face, the short hair at the back of his neck.

“Yes to you. To us. To watching you live before I have to watch you die.” She shakes her head, a movement he follows with his hands.”I have no idea how. But yes to figuring it out together.”

His hands slide down her shoulders and pull her close. Her head settles against his shoulder. His arms surround her and he tucks his head into her neck. And in the darkness, in his arms, her heart finally finds peace.


	8. Wombat

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Um, hi, Si...Ja... um." she tapers off in consternation and looks down at her feet. "Damnit," she says to her toes, painted pink for the occasion, for the first time in a year, "it was so much easier to just kiss you senseless."
> 
> \--oOo--

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A little bit of sweetness to end a tale that turned pretty serious after a funny beginning.
> 
> I hope it gives you a smile :)
> 
> \--oOo--

She paces her hallway, humming nervously to herself.

After everything she's been through in the past two days, after kissing him, having the most mindblowing sex with him, then running away from him and finally running back, dinner at Daniel's should NOT be making her this nervous.

But he told her he'd pick her up. And now it feels like a, well, _a date._

_"_Well, d'oh, Sam. You dry humped the guy against your front door last night. I think him walking back in through the same door twenty four hours later would be a date in his eyes."

She huffs. Urgo's been gone two days now and she still hasn't lost the habit of talking to herself out loud. 

She hears his truck pull up outside and glances in the hallway mirror again, tucking a strand of hair back behind her ear. Her stomach dances with frantic butterflies.

She forces herself to wait until he knocks before opening the door. _Decorum, Sam, _she hears her mother's voice in her head. _Oh mom, I am SO glad you didn't see me last night. _She flushes at the thought, and looks up into his eyes.

His smile spreads slowly as he takes her in.

"And I thought blue looked good on ya," he greets her softly.

She blushes the colour of her coral pink cardigan, bites her bottom lip. 

"Um, hi, Si...Ja... um." she tapers off in consternation and looks down at her feet. "Damnit," she says to her toes, painted pink for the occasion, for the first time in a year, "it was so much easier to just kiss you senseless."

Her hand flies to her mouth. _Where the HELL had that come from? Out LOUD?_

His laughter sounds delighted. A hand catches her chin and raises it, until she can see the mirth sparkling in his eyes. 

"We could try that again. But we may be late for team night."

His hand trails down her neck, along her arm and to her hand. 

"And I know we've got stuff to figure out, but let's try 'Jack' for tonight, okay? I think Teal'c and Daniel will understand."

She can't stop looking at his lips. She can't bear to wait all night to feel them on her skin again. She wraps one arm around his neck and presses her mouth to his, teasing her tongue against his teeth.

"Hi, Jack," she whispers against his lips.

"Oh, god, you are delicious," he groans, and his arm circles her waist possessively. "But, Daniel. Dinner." 

Her dimples carve joy into her face as she takes a step away from him. Just being near him puts her on a high.

"Before we go." He holds up a ribbon-tied package dangling from his left hand. "This wombat wanted to give you some pie."

She takes the package from him. It's trussed up in a peach ribbon. A stuffed toy wombat sits on top of a small, white cardboard box. Undoing the ribbon and opening the box, she's almost certain she knows what she will find. A miniature peach pie for one.

When she turns back, he's looking as nervous as she felt when he arrived.

"And this wombat wants to give you this." He swallows, and holds out what he's just taken out of his jeans pocket. One of those cheesy retro souvenirs - a minuscule wombat with spring-loaded paws, designed to clasp the top of a pencil.

"Do you collect wombats?" She has no idea where he found these Australian toys in the USA. "is _that_ where Urgo got your nickname from?"

As he shrugs, something shifts in the tiny wombat's clasped paws. A glint of gold.

"Oh, Jack," she breathes as he looks down at his hands and shyly retrieves a slim, gold ring from the toy's grip.

"It's a Minnessota thing, I think." His voice is husky. "A promise ring. My promise that I'll stay alive for you."

"I need you to kiss me before I cry," she whispers.

And he does.

\--oOo--

When they break out of their kiss, they're already late for Daniel's dinner.

"We should probably get going." She rubs her right hand along his cheek, revelling in the prickle of his light stubble, thrilling at the thought of it against her thighs.

She shakes her head to get rid of the thought. _Well, to save it up for later. Because that DOES need to happen. _Heat chases through her belly.

With a loving smile, he catches her right hand and moves the ring over the tip of her ring finger.

"Wait." She stops him with a word.

He glances up, concerned.

"You're putting it on the wrong hand."

"Carter?" He's breathless.

She beams her love at him like the sun. Bright, burning, sure.

"I've already said yes, remember?"  
  


He stares at her in wonder, frozen.

She shrugs and winks, a boldness she has never felt singing through her veins.

"I mean, if you want to get down on one knee and ask again, you can. But I can think of more interesting things you could be doing down there than asking a question you already know the answer to."

With an animal purr, he reaches into his pocket and pulls out his phone. 

"Daniel?" he speaks after a minute. "Carter and I are gonna be late. We." His smile lights up every part of his being. "We need to stop for champagne."

"Is that what kids call making out these days?" she asks with a saucy wink when her future husband puts down the phone.

Behind her, she can swear she hears a delighted giggle and the sound of rings tinkling against each other as hands clasp together in glee. 

But when she turns around, Urgo's not there.

\--oOo--

"Chevron seven, locked!" Walter's voice sounds through the speakers into the gate room as the stargate powers up and opens their path to a new world. They're expecting heavy resistance, and they're in full combat gear.

"God speed, SG-1." General Hammond greets them with a nod.

Sam smiles as she waits to follow her C.O. through the gate. Everything feels so similar to a week ago. Yet nothing will ever be the same. The loneliness that lurked beneath the surface of her skin is gone, replaced by a slim gold ring that rests against her heart, next to her dog tags.

And only SG-1 knows what that ring means.


End file.
